Project on Defense Alternatives

The Project on Defense Alternatives (PDA) is a "current project" of the Commonwealth Institute in Cambridge, Mass. According to its mission statement it has operated since 1991 and "has sought to adapt security policy to the challenges and opportunities of the post-Cold War era."

The statement continues, "Central to its mission is the development of 'transitional security policy,' which would serve to create conditions favorable to the advent of regional and global cooperative security regimes. In the Project's perspective a transitional security policy would:

Guarantee reliable, cost-effective defense against aggression;

Rely on military structures that do not contribute to interstate tensions, crisis instability, or arms racing;

Allow significant reductions in the level of armed forces and military spending;

Foster progress in arms control and in the gradual demilitarization of international relations; and,

Facilitate an increasing reliance on collective and global peacekeeping agencies and nonmilitary means of conflict prevention, containment, and resolution."

According to the statement, PDA's research and development activities consist of:

Policy analysis, which "offers critical appraisals of existing policy frameworks, options, and initiatives -- including, for instance, the current administration's 'Bottom Up Review,' the increased emphasis in military policy on air power, conventional wisdom and doctrine regarding peacekeeping and multinational operations, and specific instances of military conflict";

Alternative policy development, the development of practicable alternatives to existing policy;

Basic research, in which PDA "often conducts 'meta-analyses' that combine or relate available research in novel ways...[and] also undertakes or contracts basic research when gaps or flaws in existing studies dictate a need."

A recent monograph (February 18, 2004), Disappearing the Dead: Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Idea of a 'New Warfare' by PDA's co-director Carl Conetta, "examines the Pentagon's treatment of the civilian casualty issue in the Iraq and Afghan wars, reviews the 'spin' and 'news frames' used by defense officials to shape the public debate over casualties, and critiques the concept of a 'precision warfare' as misleading. Case studies include the Baghdad bombing campaign."